


XCOM: Praxis

by BenHer



Category: XCOM (Video Games) & Related Fandoms
Genre: LGBTQ Themes, Revolutionary Rhetoric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:27:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23102479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BenHer/pseuds/BenHer
Summary: A series of snapshots into the life of an XCOM resistance fighter, and her struggles on and off the battlefield.
Kudos: 3





	XCOM: Praxis

Chapter: X

Date: 7/15/35

It was generous to think of the Reaper’s main base of operations as an HQ. It didn’t look or feel that much more sophisticated than the average resistance settlement; perhaps even less so, with its only impressive feat being the city of tents surrounding the now derelict property that had once been a military training base. Even at the first hint of light in the early morning dawn, campsites were already bustling with activity. Merchants were already setting up shop selling cigarettes, canned food, and other pre-war goods in exchange for bullets and fresh meat. Over on the outskirts of camp, Reaper foot soldiers were returning from the field with freshly killed x-rays in tow; a group of volunteers pitched in to assist in lugging their kills over to a central bonfire to be carved. The alluring aroma of muton mutton marinated in sectoid gravy carried all across the campsite; which only made Lieutenant Stephanie Brown all the more irritable after being rudely awoken.

In a way she felt oddly nostalgic for all of these familiar sights and sounds. For about as long as she could remember this was her life during whatever fleeting moments of peacetime there were with the Reapers. It was a far cry from the luxurious comfort that came from living in the City Centers, but it spoke to Stephanie on a far more primal level. Having lived in the wilderness for most of her life and surviving off the fat of the land gave her an affinity for the simple outdoor life that the bustling noise of the cities couldn’t hope to compete with. But she wasn’t here to reminisce, and as the main base was slowly starting to come into view, she was beginning to wish she could be anywhere else.

“So, did Volk give you any reason why he wanted to speak to me?”

“Not a clue.” Said Argus, who was filling in for Dragonova as Volk’s second in command since she left to fight with XCOM.

“Probably just a standard debriefing, he gave a similar spiel to your friend last night.”

“We may be a unit, but ‘friend’ is a loaded term.” Stephanie and Argus sidestepped around two kids wearing Advent trooper helmets that were chasing each other around with finger guns.

“Wouldn’t it make more sense to debrief us both at the same time?” Stephanie asked.  
“It isn’t usually like him to be this unorthodox about SOP.”

“Well he did mention he had a particular interest in talking to you specifically. I don’t know what he’d be referring to otherwise, but it’s likely none of my business.”

“That’s exactly what I was afraid of.”

The main control room of the base was perhaps the most technologically advanced space the reapers occupied, even then its old computer systems were only barely held together with duct tape and spit. Volk was sitting at an old repurposed desk at the far end of the room with a set of ham radios lined to his left side; all meticulously placed in front of a diverse menagerie of dead alien trophies. Sectoids, chryssalids, vipers, and even the head of a berserker lined the walls like deer in a hunting lodge. Yet somehow the most intimidating head staring back at Stephanie was Volk’s own cold scowl of discontent. It was the kind of look he normally reserved for traitors or anyone else who broke rank, which were two things Stephanie wasn’t entirely blameless of. Though she was successfully able to maintain a veneer of general indifference, She was struggling to maintain her internal composure. It had been two years since she last served under Volk or the Reapers to any official capacity, and for a while she was confident in the knowledge that he had long since stopped caring about her abandonment from the faction. She was barely even recognizable to him, or at least she had hoped; yet somehow she had been clocked, and now it was time for her to answer for everything.

“Argus would you mind waiting outside, Lieutenant Brown and I have some catching up to do.” His tone was soft-spoken despite his hawk-like gaze still trained on Stephanie.

As argus turned to leave the room, he whispered to Stephanie under his breath. “I’ll pray for you.”

When the two of them were finally alone, the room fell deadly silent. Every second that passed felt like an hour to Stephanie. She was completely petrified, afraid that if she made any sudden moves he would strike. Stephanie had overseen her fair share of reaper interrogations and saw first hand just how brutal and cruel Volk could be when tested. He reached for something in one of the drawers, fortunately, it was just an old bottle of whiskey. As he unscrewed the cap, his demeanor appeared to soften.

“Have a seat, Brown.”

“N-No need to be so formal, we’re on a first-name basis, right?”

Stephanie was trying to act assertive, though it came out more nervous than she had wanted.

“I was on a first-name basis with your sister. You didn’t stick around long enough for me to form that kind of kinship with you.”

He was still acting surprisingly calm, Stephanie was beginning to hope that maybe this long-dreaded encounter wasn’t going to be as painful as she had feared. Not wanting to immediately get back on his bad side, Stephanie pulled up a chair and sat down.

“So what’s the deal? Was there something wrong with my performance?”

“No not at all, your performance this last op was perfectly adequate, I’m not here to question your abilities. I should give credit to Marsha where it’s due, she really shaped you into a hell of a soldier since we last met… Among other things.”

“I wish you the best of luck in thanking her, because Marsha is currently MIA, possibly dead.”

“Really, well that’s a shame.” Volk said with a slight jaunt in his tone that made Stephanie’s blood boil.

“The other soldier John sent you with spoke very highly of you last night when he reported back to me. Shah, I think his name was? The kid really seems to admire you.”

“Cut to the chase Volk, if you woke me up for a hearty congratulations on another job well-done, then I’ll gladly take that and leave.”

“I think you know exactly why you’re here right now.”

“I mean I do, I just wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt in case you decided not to be a total asshole for once.”

Volk’s initial rage began to resurface, but he quickly closed his eyes and breathed deeply.

“Alright, I'm going to be as civil as I can with you. I want you to realize that I have no interest in judging how you wish to be perceived. As far as I’m concerned you could identify as a dog for all I care and I will still see you as a valued ally.”

Stephanie clenched her fist, visibly fighting every urge not to spit in his face.

“Provided of course…” He continued “That I can trust your allegiance to the cause.”

Stephanie’s initial fear subsided. She stood up and pounded her fist on the desk.

“I just spent the last four days putting my ass on the line for the cause!” Stephanie growled.

“We fought our way through an ambush to deliver important intel on the Chosen, and you have the nerve to question my loyalty?”

“Seeing what Marsha allowed you to do to yourself under her watch, and how eager you were to betray my trust, I can’t help but be cautious.”

“So me transitioning was a betrayal to the cause? Is that what I’m hearing?”

“You forgot who you were! Woman or not, Reaper or not you took a sworn oath after Rose’s death never to indulge in the decadence of Advent’s false utopia...”

“Fuck off, using my sister as leverage against me isn’t going to work anymore! Crawling over to Advent was far from my first choice, and I would’ve never even considered it if I had the option. And even if I did, none of that is any of your goddamn business.”

“You might think this is all about you, but I don’t think you fully grasp the kind of example your actions have set for the colonists.”

Volk opened up another drawer in his desk and pulled out a crumpled piece of parchment.

“I found this plastered in a bar at one of the local shantytowns. Look familiar to you at all?”

He handed it to Stephanie and she proceeded to unravel it. It was an XCOM propaganda poster, one she decided to pose for after earning her promotion to sergeant rank. She stood triumphantly in the foreground, rifle in hand with her face to the sky and her back to an image of the XCOM insignia spray-painted in red. The tagline below, written in big bold font read: “She fights for your freedom, but she needs your help.”

“Say some other poor schmuck who thinks God did them dirty by putting them in the wrong body sees your image plastered on one of those tacky posters. What do you think is going to be their first inclination? Are they going to be inspired by your words and pick up a rifle, dropping any pretenses of taking up a cushy life in the city centers; or are they going to look at you and think ‘hey, maybe Advent could make me look like her. I should visit one of their gene therapy clinics right now!”

Stephanie chuckled.

“Quite flattering of you to assume I’m the first person to have that idea. If you spend even a minute with any rural trans community, fantasizing about gene therapy is almost all they ever talk about. That and seizing its means from Advent of course.”

“Funny you mention that. An associate of mine happens to have contact with the New Riot Grrls, one of the highest-profile queer militias in the New Oregon region. Their leader claims to be a big fan of yours, as do many of her followers. Word is you’re actually quite the celebrity within the region. Apparently your escape from New Portland wasn’t a quiet one.”

Stephanie wasn’t quite sure how to feel about that. She was never one to make herself known, so the idea of her being some kind of inspiring figure felt foreign to her. She proceeded to run her fingers over scars near the back of her head where her chip had been pulled out all those months prior; before she was eventually found by XCOM and taken in as one of their own.

“And what do you expect me to do about that?” She asked.

“Cover my face, disappear off the face of the planet? As I said, people are still going to flock to the cities regardless of my input.”

“I don’t expect you to do anything. So long as Bradford and the commander still have use for you, I can’t say I have much leverage over your decision making, but I’ll tell you what I think you should do.”

“And that is?”

“Leave the resistance.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’ve got connections to someone who knows a former Advent clinician. She can set you up with a new face, a new set of fingerprints and a fake ID. With that you can move back to the city centers where you’ll be happier and less of a danger to impressionable people on our side.”

Stephanie could barely contain her rage. She was even starting to wonder why she was so afraid of him mere minutes ago. None of his old manipulation tactics were going to work on her, not anymore.

“With all due respect Konstantine, I’m not your lapdog anymore so any attempt you make to guilt trip me into taking orders from you isn’t going to work. So what if someone decides to immigrate because of me, that’s their decision to make, not yours.”

Volk leaned forward with a furious rage in his eyes, one that even the berserker head hanging from the wall couldn’t even hope to match.

“Your sheer presence alone could be enough to send god knows how many desperate trans kids to their death, rotting away at some alien processing plant like the one your compatriots witnessed.”

“Not everyone who steps into those clinics is getting sent off to the blacksites. I spent five months in one of them and every single trans person I met there made it out just fine, hell, better than fine. There was one woman I met who came out before the war but had to closeted herself again because of how dangerous it was for her in the shantytown she was displaced to, and even when she finally left none of the other settlements had a steady enough supply of hormone medication."

Stephanie hastily wiped her saturating eyes, hoping Volk wouldn’t notice.

“The very last thing she said to me before she left was ‘After 20 years I finally feel like I can start living again’... She was over 40 when she said that. Again, I would never endorse it but if there was even a five percent chance that Advent could radically improve someone’s life like that, then I will respect anyone’s decision to take those chances.”

“Five percent, remind me again how those odds worked out for…”

“Don’t you dare bring her up again. Rose would have supported my decision just as I supported her’s, so don’t think you can keep holding that over me like that!” Stephanie snapped.

“And you say you’re so concerned for the safety of LGBTQ people in the colonies, where was this attitude when you were enlisting members of the fucking Black Sun Order into your ranks?”

“Revolution brings strange bedfellows, Ms. Brown. Compromises need to be made with those you share a common goal with, even if you disagree with them on a fundamental level. Something you could maybe learn a thing or two about.”

“Just because they want Advent gone doesn’t mean they share our goals. The Skirmishers have been far more effective allies to us and Bradford had to drag you and your forces kicking and screaming into finally reaching a truce with them! So miss me with that hypocritical respectability bullshit!”

“Betos and her merry band of Advent misfits may be an asset to us for now, but they have a lifetime of debts to repay for their crimes against Earth.”

“Crimes they did not partake in willingly.”

“You remember what they did to us back in Yosemite!”

“Oh sure we’re still gonna act like that attack was entirely unprovoked.”

“They’re not human, and until they’ve proven that they can coexist with us after all is said and done, I will always put members of my own species first. Call it what you will, I think it’s just common sense.”

“Sounds an awful lot like scapegoating if you ask me! You’re so afraid of what you can’t control that you’re willing to blame anyone you see as an easier target, even if they’re the people who are being exploited the most.”

“Did you just accuse me of being a coward?”

“The Skirmishers, trans people, hell anyone who would rather move to the city centers than live in the woods shitting in a bucket for twenty years. These people are not your enemy, the Elders are your enemy, the corrupt system they put into place that is forcing people into making these decisions in the first place, THAT is your enemy. This was something Marsha understood that either you can’t seem to wrap your head around, or you choose not to.”

“Marsha was a traitor and a deserter, and the fact that she allowed you to step within a mile of one of those deathtraps makes me all the more convinced that her little commie experiment was doomed from the start!”

“You’re a fascist!”

“And you’re walking Advent propaganda!”

Stephanie bolted for the door.

“Hey come back, I haven’t dismissed you yet.”

“You’re not the commander, I’m dismissing myself!”

“You’re still violating the chain of command!”

She stopped in her tracks and turned around to face him one last time.

“You really want to question other people’s allegiances, tell me whose side are you going to take when Advent is gone?”


End file.
